


A Midsummer Night

by yfere



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Caduceus is sheeple, Caleb's irrational guilt complex, I'm contractually obligated to write Caduceus as sheeple now, M/M, Masturbation, Pre-Relationship, Ritual Sex, Skinny Dipping
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-02
Updated: 2019-02-02
Packaged: 2019-10-20 22:09:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17630606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yfere/pseuds/yfere
Summary: Caduceus asks for Caleb's help with a ritual.





	A Midsummer Night

Magic and sex wasn’t something Caleb was unfamiliar with. They’d made a bit of a game of it once, the three of them, seeing how well they could maintain their concentration when they—but it hadn’t been right away. And it hadn’t been— _divine._

  
The symbol of the Archeart weighed in his pocket. He swallowed thickly, and began to scan the runic circle laid within the grass for the glimmer of powdered silver.

  
Caduceus’ hand landed on his back, warm and heavy as the scent of incense that accompanied it. “Something is worrying you. What is it?”

  
Caleb’s eyes shut for a moment. At least he was spared the embarrassment of having to bring it up. The only question was which hesitation to deal with first. “Caduceus, when you brought me here, you said it was to help—with a dedication? To your god?”

  
“Yes, that’s right.” Caduceus shifted from his side so that he entered Caleb’s line of sight. In the moonlight his nude body shimmered, dusted with—ah. That was where the powdered silver was, then. He wondered briefly about frequency, the bluish-grey tint of Caduceus’ wool and the skin underneath, about what he’d read from medical textbooks about discoloration from colloidal silver. From there his mind shot ahead to tattoos, to Orly, then far too quickly to crystals, inserted into the arms—

  
—And down that road there was nothing good, so he patted his pocket, fingers twitching, and tried to refocus. “One of my concerns is that, uh, I do not worship—”

  
“No worries there. You don’t have to. It’s not that kind of dedication.”

  
He tried not to look too obviously relieved. Judging from the amused quirk of Caduceus’ lips Caleb could just make out of his peripheral vision, he didn’t entirely succeed. “Might be something to think about, though,” Caduceus said. “The Wildmother has done a lot for you. For all of us.”

  
“I did not take you for a missionary.” By that point, Caduceus had spent enough time around Jester to understand the joke, and huff a laugh. He gestured down at himself.

  
“No, this is—this is more to renew my vows, than anything. It needs to be done, on occasion.”

  
Caleb smiled slightly, and made another mark on his mental calendar for Caduceus. He was so fastidiously regular about these things. Like catmint, always opening its blooms at the same precise time of the morning. Caleb had a fond theory that if he spent enough time around Caduceus, learned enough of his habits, he would be able to close his eyes and predict exactly what he was doing at any time. It was—soothing, in its way.

  
But not quite soothing enough. Because even if curiosity and a faint desire to help had brought him out here, once Caduceus had begun unceremoniously stripping, made mention of exactly what he meant to do, Caleb realized he was getting ever so slightly out of his depth. _Still_ — “What would you have me do? What does this—ah—dedication involve?”

  
“Well, I thought it would help a lot if you set up one of your silver threads out around here. I’ve never been attacked while doing this, but this takes a while, and you can never be too careful when you’re by yourself and you’re not wearing armor.”

  
“If you’re worried about being attacked, I may not be the best—”

  
“I’m not worried. It’s just good to be safe.” Caduceus smiled lazily. “Honestly, it would be nice if you would just shoo away any, say, deer that wander over this way. I’ve had some curious critters come by in the past, and it’s—distracting. Also, I’d like you to keep an eye on me in case I start feeling any side effects. You’d be looking for vomiting, seizures, more likely just agitation. If it’s bad, then you can message Jester for help. She’ll know what to do.”

  
“Did you take something?”

  
“Naturally. It should kick in fully in ten minutes or so. Again, I’m not worried. I’m experienced with this.”

  
“I believe it.” Caleb was half tempted to ask why he didn’t just ask Jester to watch over him, but he thought he understood. Besides the awkward matter of her being a cleric of the Traveler, this looked like something Caduceus wanted a certain amount of quiet for, a lack of fuss. That was fine. Caleb was good at quiet. “Is there anything else you need?”

  
“Hmmm.” Caduceus’ speech was slowing down the more they spoke. Caleb wondered if it came from whatever he had taken. “There are certain parts of this ritual that work better with two people involved, but it might be hard to explain all of that now. For now, I think you’d pick up on most of it just by watching, if you’re interested in it. It’s up to you.”

  
“If—I may, I will just keep watch over you this time,” Caleb said.

  
“Yes, that’s a good idea. I think you’d get the hang of it quickly enough for the next time, if you wanted. You have a good memory.”

  
That. That he did.

  
And it was a terrible thing, Caleb thought, threading his wire around the thick, gnarled trees of the perimeter and muttering the incantation of the alarm spell to himself. It was terrible because it was magic, and even if it wasn’t _his_ kind of magic, he couldn’t help but be horribly curious about it. And because of that he couldn’t help _but_ watch, as Caduceus paced around the ritual circle in an odd springing half-dance. As he set down bowls on the edges, filled them with herbs, and lit them on fire. As he laid himself down carefully in the dewy undergrowth between them, half-lidded eyes seemingly backlit by the shine of the moon, as he bared his neck to look at the sky.

  
Alarm in place, Caleb noted the position of the bowls, identified their contents by the aroma that welled around them. He noted how Caduceus had lined up his body so that his feet pointed south and his head north. How his feet, his forehead, and the tops of his hands were coated in red, oily, clay-like mud. How the flickering flames and the shifting foliage gave the appearance of many shadowy hands, running all along his body.

  
A faint breeze blew around them. It was warm, but Caleb shivered nonetheless.

  
Caduceus’ wool, still short for the warm weather, stood on end, unfurled from its usual close curls. Each individual particle of silver glittered in stark relief against the ends—little stars, held in suspension above his skin. It was difficult, not to become transfixed.

  
It was then that Caduceus began to hum. Caleb wasn’t entirely unfamiliar with this either, with Caduceus’ throaty voice or the tunes he’d half-hum, half-sing when he was deeply involved in a complicated recipe. But this humming had a flavor of thaumaturgy to it, emanating not from Caduceus himself, but the entire forest floor around them, vibrating up through Caleb’s legs to his spine and resting at the back of his skull. And the melody was unlike anything he’d heard from him before, pitching dizzyingly between a low, sonorous keening, and trilling high whines. It felt in a sense like Caleb had been caught by the ankle and was being swung through the air.

  
At some point his eyes slid shut. Snapping them open again, he found that both Caduceus’ body and the runic circle around him were suffused with light—like they had lapped up all the fire and the moonlight, filled themselves until they pulsed with it. Looking closer, he could see that—yes. There was a faint dimming and brightening that followed, if not Caduceus’ heartbeat, then certainly Caleb’s own. A gentle beat that followed as well with the rise and fall of the music, softer now, around them.

  
Caduceus’ fingers raised to the dark mass of oily clay on his forehead, and began to spread it, tracing spiraling designs across his cheeks, the bridge of his nose. As he dragged the clay from his chin to his neck, Caleb understood the designs for what they were—runes—and wondered at their similarity to the embroidered whorls on Caduceus’ clothing. Was it a modification? What meaning did they have? It certainly wasn’t like any alphabet he’d seen before. He resisted the urge to throw a pocketful of soot to make sure.

  
There’d be time for that later. He might miss something, doing that now.

  
The thick stripe of runes Caduceus drew ran from his forehead down his neck and chest, ending with a complicated loop a little ways past his navel, on the lower edge of his abdomen. From there, Caduceus began tracing from the clay on the back of his left hand up his arm, and down his side. Then, the same for his right hand. When he reached the junction of his hips he twitched for a moment, breathed a low gasp that blended, nearly lost, into the humming. Caleb took an anxious step forward, but—no, it wasn’t a spasm, or a seizure. He settled back onto his heels, and watched Caduceus begin working from his feet, up his calves and thighs. He found his own fingers twirling slightly at his sides, a familiar feeling in the sensation, like the days he’d practiced the swooping gesture of counterspell—

  
Caduceus’ fingers halted, sealing with a flourish the twisting circlet of red that enclosed his penis, now erect, at attention. This might be the point when—it was probably best if he—

  
Caleb meant to look up and past Caduceus, miming as if something had triggered the alarm spell behind him. But as he lifted his head, Caduceus’ eyes caught his, and.

  
He froze.

  
Wide and glassy and far too dark—none of that was anything to worry about, not a symptom he was meant to look for. Something to be expected, really. But a thin thread of panic wound around his throat all the same, a delicate garroting wire. Because in those eyes was a command, sharp and forceful and very nearly dangerous. _You are not done here._

  
Okay. Okay.

  
And he was curious, too.

  
He held his breath, waited for the wire to loosen and dissolve.

  
The breeze picked up, hotter now, more abrasive. Like ash kicked up from a campfire, like nails scraping along his cheeks. Caduceus’ whole body trembled, as he took himself in hand. And Caleb could see, after a while, why Caduceus wanted him to stay in place. Because it wasn’t like—there was a sense that his movements weren’t chasing sensation so much as they were following a carefully choreographed, memorized dance. That this was as much as much a precise process as the herbs, and the runes, the light and the song and whatever substance Caduceus had taken before it all started. His hands ran in circles along his shaft, thumbs swirling around the head, and back down, to scrape along his balls. Always the same pace, with movements only varying so much as a spin in the midst of a Ländler.

  
Caduceus shook, and gasped, and moaned.

  
Caleb realized he didn’t know when the music had turned into this—realized that one sounded very much like the other, so that maybe he _ought_ to have noticed, nearer to the beginning. If he tried maybe he could backtrack, reel in his memory to pinpoint the right moment. But not now, when every sigh seemed to puff against the shell of his ear, when Caduceus’ voice vibrated along the soles of his feet and thudded at his temples. And perhaps it had been a mistake to—

  
Caduceus was growing brighter. With a flash and a scream he finished, and all of the silvered light that had concentrated on his person seemed to bleed back into the atmosphere, so that Caleb had to wonder if it had been a kind of hallucination, a trick of the imagination the entire time. Caduceus’ breath was heavy and loud, but it was coming from his throat, and nowhere else. Caleb watched him lift a hand, covered with clay and semen both, and lick a stripe down his palm to his wrist, groaning.

 

 

 

 

 

  
“Mr. Caleb,” he said, eventually. “I can’t think—there was a river around here?”

  
“Southeast. Quarter of a mile from camp.” And because it seemed all right at that point, he went over to help Caduceus up. Really he was more of a glorified crutch—it was all he could do to remain upright as Caduceus leaned against him, boneless and very, very heavy. “Do you need—?” he gestured at the circle, and the materials in it.

  
“I’ll need the bowls back. The rest, we leave.” So Caleb staggered with Caduceus over to a tree and propped him against it, before gathering the bowls, Caduceus’ folded clothing, and the silver wire that hadn’t been of much use after all. Caduceus was smiling when he returned, and looking a little dazed.

  
“You aren’t feeling any nausea, are you?”

  
“Not at all.”

  
“What you took—when will it be wearing off?”

  
Caduceus tilted his head back against the trunk. “Oh…probably morning, I think.”

  
“Oh. Well, the river is this way…can you walk?”

  
He could, mostly, though Caleb needed to help him navigate at a few points when keeping their footing became trickier. Caduceus seemed interested in looking at just about everything except where his feet were going. He stopped them once so he could gather a black, shelf-like mushroom from a fallen trunk. Another time, as Caleb leaned over to make it down a ridge Caduceus tucked his hair behind his ear, nearly making him fall over in surprise. “It’s a nice color,” he said, at Caleb’s stare.

  
Finally, they’d made it to the river’s banks, upstream from a partial dam that made the water slower and deeper—perfect for wading. Caduceus settled in with a sigh of pleasure. He was tall enough it was really only a matter of walking in for him, at least for a while, the tip of his beard just slightly brushing the surface of the water. Caleb thought absurdly of Jester and her watercolors.

  
“Ah. Your coat,” Caduceus said, after a moment. Caleb looked down and—oh. While he’d been supporting Caduceus, a good deal of reddish clay had rubbed off on it. Which wouldn’t be a problem, really, if it weren’t that dried semen was also on the coat, and even if Caleb didn’t want to wash it, not really, he also didn’t want to deal with the scrutiny of _not_. So he sighed, and began pulling it off his shoulders. Then, considering for a moment— _fick es_. He pulled off the rest of his clothing too, ignoring the surprised whistle from Caduceus behind him, placed his and Caduceus’ clothing both underneath the weight of the now-empty bowls. Then, putting the coat back on, he squinted at Caduceus’ head above the water, made some quick calculations, and took a running leap.

  
When he came back to the surface, Caduceus was still rubbing water out of his eyes. Harder for him, with the wool on his face all soaked and having no means to push it out of the way. “I didn’t expect you to do that,” he groused.

  
“I do wash, you know.”

  
“Not what I meant, but okay.”

  
Caleb hid a smile, and made a quick backstroke to get closer to the banks. It would get exhausting for him to keep treading water in the middle.

  
Caduceus washed sporadically, seemingly only when the mood struck him or he happened to remember what they were doing there. For a few minutes he did nothing but keep his hands splayed over the surface of the water, face rapt as he watched the slight current and the metallic sheen of the ripples curving around his fingers. Caleb concentrated on scrubbing out the stains in his coat. A comfortable silence settled between them, so that after a time Caleb felt like he was drifting himself, like someone had punctured the bubble of his thoughts and left his worries to slowly leak away.

  
“I want to thank you, Mr. Caleb,” Caduceus said. His wool was clean now, if very wet. “You were a lot of help tonight.”

  
The stress came rushing back. _Greedy,_ whispered an ugly voice in the back of his mind. _Voyeur. You didn’t actually need to learn any of that. You didn’t need to let him—_

  
Caduceus looked a little bewildered, so Caleb willed himself to relax. “Not at all,” he muttered. “I am glad you are doing well. I hope you accomplished everything you meant to.”

  
“I expected you to have more questions. Did you learn…?”

  
Caleb breathed out. A strange feeling gripped at him, half upset and half suffocating affection. Past it all, the still, cool tranquility of the river and the quiet night. Better to go back to not thinking. “Maybe in the morning,” he said. “I’ll ask you something in the morning.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm...not sure what happened here. Please let me know what you think


End file.
